Everyone and their mother’s best friend seems to love macarons. On one hand, I totally get it. The pretty colors, the intriguing fillings, and the attention to detail required all make this French pastry quite a sweetheart…but you all know that I’m a crank and after successfully tackling the macaron, I kind of stopped caring.
Well, I guess that’s not true. I’ve made other things with similar ingredients and nearly identical little feet. Some might, in fact, say that in the face of a complicated process, I was being the fox who spurned sour grapes. But for this family, it’s not about grinding up foraged mushrooms to create a supremely weird delightfully unique little sandwich cookie. In fact, we don’t even want the filling because for us it is all about that heavenly ménage à trois between egg white, ground almonds, and sugar. In fact, that’s what originally drew me towards brutti ma buoni, because with a name like ‘Ugly but Good’ how can you not fall in love?« Read the rest of this entry »

I’ve always loved pickles. I could never tell you why, really. My favorite thing about sandwiches is the nice, fresh deli pickle spear that you get on the side sometimes, and without fail it’s what I snatch from my family’s trays rather than their fries, which are the usual victims of kidnapping. But it’s not just fresh pickles that I love. Those weird-ish looking yellow-green pickles that might have lost some of their crispness after living for so long in a jar? Yep, I love them too. And sometimes (this is gross) but I’ll even drink pickle juice. So yeah, I love pickles.

I’ve been bitten by the candy making bug! I made another batch of caramels the other day and I’ve been wanting to dabble in more candy-making ever since! It’s the holiday season and we’ve received several packages of chocolate covered sponge candy from friends back home. It’s sometimes called honeycomb or sponge toffee, but Buffalonians call it sponge candy, and I imagine it’s something that I won’t be able to shake. Much like my nasally ‘A’. Or my apparently insanely bizarre pronunciation of the word bison.

So what do you do when your previously carnivorous friend decides to go vegan? Kill her. That’s right, you begrudgingly make room for her new eating habits and remember than when you, yourself, were a vegetarian she graciously accepted that as well. Except wait…that’s not even true. My best friend used to dangle pieces of meat at me during meals together and poke fun at my decision to be a vegetarian. Well the tables sure have flipped now, haven’t they? Because here I am, the one who eats almost everything, and there she is in North Carolina, eating tofu, beans, and greens.

I love rosemary. I think it’s awesome. It has a great scent, looks nice, and adds a nice dimension of flavor to everything. I want to roll around in bales of rosemary, douse myself in rosemary infused oils, and dare I say it? I would even take it out on a date. Go nice and slow so I don’t scare her off. Because, guys, Rosemary is the herb of my dreams.

Okay, well that’s debatable, but it’s true that I do love rosemary. I always buy it in larger quantities than I really need (for steak) and since it tends to go brown at the tips and lose it flavor pretty quickly, I typically end up tossing a good 80% of it in the garbage. But not this time. This time I’m determined to use as much of that blessed herb as I can. In anticipation, I added lots of recipes to my queue, aiolis, different types of bread, and infused oils, but it turns out that preparation was unnecessary because this bread was so well-received that there was close to no rosemary left at the end of two days.

On another, really random note, I think Rosemary would be a great name for a girl. Though I really shouldn’t be allowed to name kids because I also think Eugenie, Rose, and a handful of other ‘old man’ and ‘old lady’ names are also great. I’ve made a few friends at college that, I’m sure, won’t allow me near the hospital until that baby is named with the birth certificate signed and notarized. Yeah, I should probably not be allowed near children…ever.

This recipe has been in my queue for a long time. I mean…forever. It’s probably been bookmarked since before the meteor crashed into earth and killed all the dinosaurs this blog was even started. Somehow, for some probably stupid and now unknown reasons, I never got to make it until now.

See the thing is, I have a confession. I love Nanaimo bars…and honestly, all things Canadian. Give me some maple candy, gravy and cheese smothered poutine, and some snow and I will love you forever and ever. I grew up right on the border between the US and Canada, and for some reason my town was one that liked to make fun of the Canadiennes. Whether for their funny cute pronunciation of about, their stupid fun name for policemen, and their unprofessional awesome colored money!

I don’t care what kind of flack I get from my hometowners, because trips to Toronto were an integral part of my childhood. I loved shopping on Queen Street, getting haircuts in Chinatown, and stopping at many a Tim Hortons on the two hour trips there and back. The cool thing about living on the border is that you get to experience two cultures that are slightly different. I’ll never forget the funny confusion that involved my parents, a Canadian Tim Hortons, and the startling difference in sizing. In that way, Canada is kind of European, I guess. Never really super-sizing things and spelling things like the Brits.

Looking back, I’ve come to realize that Toronto was ‘my city’. In the same way that for some it’s New York City. Despite having lived in New York for most of my life, I’ve been to the city less times than there are fingers on my hand while trips to Toronto are more than I can begin to count. Even now in college, it’s very comforting to sit down at the bakery/coffee/bagel shop and nibble on a creamy, indulgent Nanaimo bar. Considering how simple it is to whip these up at home, that seems like a habit that will be quickly kicked.

So the first semester of college has drawn to an end, and I know I’ve left you high and dry, post-wise and I am so sorry! Let me just get that apology off my chest and out there for everyone. But I’m back at one of my homes now, and it is so lovely. I’ve missed my family, I can’t even begin to describe to you how much. They’re goofy, fun, loving, and awesome. And they know me so well, because guess where my first stop after coming back to Georgia was? Yup. To the grocery store!

So after lugging home more than I could eat’s worth of persimmons, honey crisp apples, and oyster mushrooms, I arrived home to this rad banner that my goofball sister made me and both her and my dad hanging out in their pajamas. Hugs and kisses and unpacking were partaken in, and shortly after, sleep. Waking up today, I got to eat some of my mom’s cooking that I have missed so much at college. Cornell might have some of the best college food around, but it’s no comparison for home cooked, small batch food. « Read the rest of this entry »